


What's the purpose of this meeting?

by Kana_Go



Series: Russian to English translations [10]
Category: Captain America (Movies), Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them (Movies)
Genre: Gen, Humor, Hydra (Marvel), Translation in English
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-21
Updated: 2018-09-21
Packaged: 2019-07-15 08:01:27
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,385
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16058921
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kana_Go/pseuds/Kana_Go
Summary: One day Alexander Pierce set up an emergency meeting.





	What's the purpose of this meeting?

**Author's Note:**

  * A translation of [По какому поводу собрание?](https://archiveofourown.org/works/10336658) by [Schwesterchen](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Schwesterchen/pseuds/Schwesterchen). 



 “What's the purpose of this meeting?” Atcheson whispered.

Rumlow shrugged and made a valiant attempt to swallow the rest of his coffee from the paper cup.

“Hell if I know… Some sort of announcement.”

He crushed the cup in his fingers: in Pierce’s opinion, in his presence the subordinates were to either work their asses off or hang on every single word he said. Or lie dead at the very least. But certainly not drink coffee.

Now the boss looked like a very dark cloud so Rumlow rightly feared to annoy him even further.

Meanwhile Pierce was scanning the crowd in silence. The crowd, by the way, was unusually big. With increasing surprise Rumlow noticed even a little bunch of cleaning ladies who were huddling in the corner in alarm. What kind of announcement could it possibly be?

“I can see everyone’s here,” Pierce’s voice wasn’t loud, but his intonation didn’t bode well. “In that case we can start. I’m not going to make you impatient, let me get right to the point. Alas, the picture’s not nice…”     
Rumlow rapidly started to feel real uncomfortable.

What if the old man had become paranoid and decided to get rid of all of them in one fell swoop? Yep, including the cleaning ladies. For preventive purposes.  Locked doors, a portion of poisonous gas – voila, stacks of dead bodies would be ready to be carried out. And then he’d recruit the new staff.

Feeling his hair standing up on the back of his neck, Rumlow stepped on his own foot. God, what nonsense… Who was paranoid here after all? He overcame a panic attack, made himself listen for real and almost collapsed to the floor with relief. Mass liquidation was indefinitely postponed. Pierce had just lost his signet.   

“A quarter of an hour ago I was working in my office and suddenly I had a leaky pen,” Pierce said with an expression of reserved grief. “I removed my signet not to stain it, put it onto the table and went to wash my hands. But when I came back…”

He made a dramatic pause and looked at his subordinates very attentively.  
The crowd was silent. No, really – Rumlow took the liberty of raising his eyebrow subtly. Where could the signet possibly go in two little minutes? From the locked (Pierce always locked himself while working) office? It wasn’t like the trinket was expensive anyway, nothing of the kind. No one knew the story behind the signet, only a few rumors, but it was clear that it had some sentimental value to the old man because there was nothing like platinum or at least gold in it. Just el cheapo for a few bucks.

The silence was getting uncomfortable. Pierce frowned.

“Maybe the cleaning ladies dusted your table?” one of the secretaries broke down finally. “Or it rolled under the sofa?” 

Rumlow subdued the desire to make an exemplary facepalm, but the cleaning ladies sank into a collective faint, just in case. Only one of them was still on her feet. Judging by her size and look of decision, this lady was able to stand against the Winter Soldier with only a broom in her hand. It was she who informed Pierce that no cleaning had been scheduled for that time.

“Some change disappeared out of my pocket yesterday,” someone in the crowd said thoughtfully.

“Half of the forks in the cafeteria are missing!”

“A scalpel!”

“Ammo!”

When all the rumpus subsided, there was really confused silence in the conference room. It turned out that in the last three days the organization had been struck by a wave of minor and not so minor losses, but the magnitude of this wave became clear only now. And truly threatening it was.

“Maybe the shrinks should be involved?” Hailey suggested over Rumlow’s shoulder. “Have them examine everyone for kleptomania. Why not? The job’s stressful, somebody may be relaxing in this way…”  
“Based on the number of missing things, we must have a dozen of these ‘someones’”, Atcheson objected over Rumlow’s other shoulder. “Besides, they must be able to get into any hole.”

They digested this valuable information and started thinking again. Because of the creak of cogs and wheels in everyone’s brain the creak of the door remained unnoticed.

“Sorry for interrupting…”  
Everyone stepped aside briskly – so briskly that someone was even knocked off their feet. And not surprisingly: standing on the carpet was the Winter Soldier accompanied by a technician who looked as pale as a sheet. The Soldier had the technician on his right arm, and his left arm… Well, at first Rumlow, who happened to stand uncomfortably close to them, thought that the Soldier had somehow got hold of a platypus and for some reason tried to turn it inside out. But then he took a closer look and understood that the metal limb went not to the creature’s mouth, but to its… stomach? More precisely, to its pouch. Up to the elbow.    
“What’s this?” Pierce inquired in surprise.

“No idea, sir,” the technician reported in a trembling voice. “It just appeared near the Asset, grabbed his prosthesis and tried to stick it in its…”

“Sorry, it belongs to me!”  
It was getting really crowded in the conference room which was already packed. Rumlow’s jaw hit the floor when he stared at a red-haired guy who’d just appeared next to the Soldier out of thin air.

“It’s my animal! Don’t hurt it!”  
The guy was talking fast and looking nervous – stiff and a bit awry.

Rumlow tensed up reflexively. It could be an attempt on Pierce’s life after all.

“Who are you?” Pierce frowned. “How did you get here?”

“It’s my niffler,” the guy confided to Rumlow, blinking quickly without looking in his eyes. As for Pierce’s questions, he completely ignored them. “It’s utterly harmless, but it adores shiny things. I’m taking it back. Hold still.”  
Apparently the last sentence was addressed to the Soldier who was already acting extremely unperturbed for a person whose arm was being stolen.

The guy grabbed the little creature by the scruff of its neck and pulled it off the prosthesis expertly. Then he turned it upside-down, opened its pouch with his finger, shook it, and a small clanking waterfall hit the expensive carpet.

 _So this is where all the forks went_ , Rumlow thought. _And everything else, too_.  
But before he could inspect the contents of the heap properly, the redhead stepped back and with his free hand fished out a ten-inch thin wooden stick from inside his coat. Rumlow rushed to him, but froze perplexed.

“I’m really sorry,” the guy said. “Now I have to cast an oblivion spell.”

 _Cast what?_ Rumlow wanted to ask, but before he opened his mouth the guy waved his ridiculous stick and… 

“What's the purpose of this meeting?” Atcheson whispered.

Rumlow shrugged.

“It seems like the boss has lost his signet,” he answered rather tentatively. “By the way, here it is.”

Leaning over the heap of forks, nails, coins and shells out of which a scalpel was sticking edgewise coyly, Rumlow picked up the signet carefully. When he stood up, he found himself face to face with the Soldier.  

“What is the Asset doing here?” Rumlow inquired into the void.

People started to go about their business, muttering something under their breath. All faces sported a funny expression. Even the Soldier’s one. The technician took in the situation and dragged him away quickly. Now it was just Rumlow with the signet in his hand and Pierce in the room.

“Agent Rumlow, you’ve found my signet,” the man exclaimed happily. “I always knew I was right about you. I'll make sure you get a nice bonus. ”

“Thank you, sir,” Rumlow answered. “I do my best, sir.”

He could feel void in his head. Void and some sort of scratchy not entirely pleasant feeling as if he’d forgotten something. Rumlow scratched his head quite impolitely, but to no effect: the feeling was still there. What the hell?

“By the way, I’m still waiting for the report on yesterday’s mission,” Pierce added when Rumlow was already at the door.

The report! Of course! Rumlow immediately felt relieved and at ease.

“Yes, sir, I'll get right on that,” he promised and closed the door carefully behind him.

 

THE END


End file.
